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Brady Campaign has trouble thinking thru its position

Posted by David Hardy · 4 May 2011 05:42 PM

Paul Helmke has a post at HuffingtonPost. Quite interesting. On the one hand, he criticizes NRA for arguing the "slippery slope" to more and more gun controls. On the other, he claims that the number of households with guns is declining, and that

"This is very good news for public health and safety. Research shows that a high rate of household gun ownership is associated with higher rates of accidental gun deaths, higher rates of suicide and gun suicide, and higher rates of homicide and gun homicide. The continuing national decline in gun ownership is unquestionably a lifesaving trend."

Without bothering to debate the accuracy of those claims -- if Brady's position is that fewer guns means fewer homicide and suicides, how can it take a principled position that "we want modest controls, and not to confiscate guns or make gun ownership difficult for the sake of making it difficult"? It can be consistent only by arguing "we want to reduce gun ownership as far as we can, and if we stop it's only because more burdens are not feasible just now."